Chicken and Orzo with Goat Cheese

There are some things you just have to make work. Being married, you get plenty of practice!

I don’t like dill. He doesn’t care for very much lemon. Neither of us are overly crazy about feta. Normally, a recipe built around those would get vetoed quickly but with such a simple foundation of other Ingredients like pasta and chicken, I’d make this one work. Really, the bonus was that it gets almost no dishes dirty. And since I hate doing dishes, I’d definitely make it work.

It’s a two-cooking dish meal. Solids go in a baking dish, hot liquids are poured over it. Give it a stir and throw it in the oven. The end product is a tangy, creamy, and hearty one-bowl dinner that we both enjoyed. And it’s completely adaptable to any miscellaneous ingredients that you have hanging around.

And can I just say that even after 5 or 6 years and a new baby, it still makes me swoon to hear things like, “I really like how you added sun-dried tomatoes and the panko topping,” coming from my former-Stouffer’s-and-Red-Baron connoisseur. And they say men don’t change.

Katie – I’m not sure what other kind of cheese could be substituted. It would have to be a cheese that melts and incorporates into the broth easily. The recipe could be revamped to be more of a mac & cheese style dish (pre-cooked pasta baked with roux-cheese mixture) and then you could use gruyere and cheddar… but it becomes much more involved at that point.

I’ve made the original version of this w/the feta, dill, etc. I also used salmon instead of chicken once. I love these flavors so much though, so I’m definitely going to try your version – probably next week!